As is known, in cutting machines for leather and similar materials, which have a cutting area with one or more cutting heads and an area for unloading cut parts, arranged along a conveyor belt, it is often desirable to cut parts in an aligned manner, with a precision on the order of tenths of a millimeter on materials printed with references and logos.
In view of the limited rigidity of the printed material, it is not possible to calculate in advance the exact position of the parts to be cut, but it is necessary to readjust a theoretical position calculated beforehand according to the actual position of the references of the material arranged in the cutting area.
For this purpose, TV cameras are used which detect the exact position of the references printed on the material to be cut, in order to readjust the position of the parts before cutting them. This operation is normally performed when the material is already positioned in the cutting area, by using a TV camera which is mounted on the same carriage that supports the cutting head, which views sequentially limited portions of the material arranged on the cutting area.
After this operation, the control processes the information to readjust the position of the parts to be cut.
Substantially, an operation for cutting leather or similar material is preceded by a step for loading the material onto the cutting area, a step for detecting the exact configuration of the references provided on the material to be cut, and a step for processing the information in order to readjust the position of the parts to be cut.
However, the known types of cutting machines described above suffer the drawback of having to perform the three operations cited above before being able to proceed with the cutting of the material.
This of course entails an expenditure of time.
Moreover, with known types of systems it is not possible to perform in parallel the detection and processing operations and the cutting operations.